Father of baseball player killed in bus crash campaigns for improved bus safety

    John Betts, father of David Betts, the Bluffton College baseball player who was killed when a bus collision on an Atlanta freeway overpass decimated his team, has devoted considerable energy to a campaign to improve the safety of interstate and charter buses.

  The Bluffton team was decimated en route to a spring training  game, when the busdriver misinterpreted traffic controls and essentially launched the bus off the overpass.  Four players were killed and numerous others were injured.  Mr. Betts pledged to the young men within an hour of identifying  his son at the morgue, that "something good must come from this tragedy".  He has done his utmost to fulfill that pledge; reviewing tens of thousands of pages of safety studies and data, creating a website--www.motorcoachsafetynow.com, and lobbied the government.  Among the changes he seeks:  seat belts and improved seating; stronger roofs; glazed windows to prevent passenger ejection; fire protection; driver testing standards and physical exams; electronic data recorders [they would allow verification of speed and hours of operation, for example] and safety inspections.